Welcome to Sporting Assets

Sporting Assets is social enterprise that helps develop sustainable sports enterprises, by taking ownership of facilities, developing new ones and by helping to create or diversify revenue streams. Sporting Assets puts sport at the centre of improving outcomes for communities by creating social cohesion, sports participation, jobs, health and well-being; whilst enhancing social impact and financial sustainability. From playing fields to angling lakes to swimming pools, Sporting Assets can help protect, acquire, finance and manage local sporting assets.

Case Studies

Lewes FC

Sporting Assets is currently working with community owned Lewes FC on their exciting plans to develop their stadium into a 24/7 community village. The overall project will require over ￡6 million of finance, transforming a community owned football club into a social enterprise central to the community, with a diverse revenue base and a financially sustainable future not reliant on match day related income.

Sporting Assets is providing a range of bespoke services that include project management support, devising and implementing strategic development plans and finding the funding. We have so far raised £850,000 to finance a 3G pitch, which was built in 2015 and is now operational. That included ￡200,000 raised by a Community Share Offer, with subscribers receiving 30% tax relief on their investment. In addition to this we secured Lewes FC a ￡63,000 feasibility grant meaning the club did not have to pay for a significant amount of our support.

We are now working with Lewes FC on the next phase; a multi-functional clubhouse with a community café, which will be a delivery point for many new and innovative local services. The project is expected to cost approximately £1.1m, which will be funded by a blend of grants and social investment. Funding has been received from Big Potential for Sporting Assets and partners to work with Lewes FC on this stage.

City of Birmingham Basketball Club

City of Birmingham Basketball Club (COBBC) is a thriving basketball club in the heart of Birmingham, based at the Nechells Wellbeing Centre.

Go on a Saturday morning and ‎you’ll see a hive of activity with youngsters from across Birmingham playing competitive basketball, under the expert eye of coach Rob Palmer and an army of volunteers, often parents who have gotten involved from the sidelines after coming to watch their children. One of their supporters is NBA Legend Hakeem ‘The Dream’ Olajuwon! The club is proud of their track record in getting some of their players into university, often in the US on a sports scholarship. They also do outreach work in clubs across the city as well as summer camps.

COBBC is now looking to the future and aims to have more paid staff to help deliver impact for a number of partners, such as those working in health and education, as well as to give people of all ages and abilities the chance to play basketball. Sporting Assets is working with them to research and plan that future as part of a lottery funded Big Potential project. Watch this space.

East Lancashire Football Development Association

Sporting Assets is working with the East Lancashire Football Development Association (ELFDA), a collective of amateur football league associations in Blackburn and Darwen, North West England.

The objective of this ongoing project is to enable the ELFDA to undertake a community asset transfer and restore 9 football pitches on playing fields transferred from their Local Authority. The site will become a local junior football hub and allow the ELDFA to become a strategic lead for amateur football in the area. Sporting Assets role was to investigate the proposed asset transfer via a feasibility study, which was approved by all stakeholders. The initial completed feasibility study was a unique and innovative partnership between Blackburn with Darwen Council, Lancashire County Football Association, the Blackburn Rovers Supporters’ Trust and the ELFDA.

Sporting Assets has now secured £450,000 in development and capital funding to restore the football pitches, and works commenced in March 2016 with an estimated finish date of June 2016. Sporting Assets is now working on a community share offer to finance the football equipment and pitch maintenance machinery, which will enable ELFDA to operate as a sustainable business and keep the pitches maintained to an excellent standard for years to come.

British Canoeing

Sporting Assets supported the British Canoeing (BC) Places to Paddle team in its review of the local sites that they own or lease across England.

This review focused on the governance and relationship between local areas and Head Office, operational management and financial sustainability including future investment models and maximising the sites’ contribution to BC’s new 5 year strategy including on participation. Collaborative work between the Sporting Assets team and that at British Canoeing meant we were able to complement each others skills and knowledge.

Ben Seal, Places to Paddle Manager at BC said: “Sporting Assets were able to offer innovative options on social investment, building on what we had already. They worked with us to understand our organisation and added real value in a supportive and collaborative way.”

Tynemouth Outdoor Pool

At the southern end of Tynemouth Beach, on the North East coast, lies the decaying remains of Tynemouth outdoor swimming pool. The pool was built in the 1920s to provide a safe place to swim, and was extremely popular with both locals and holidaymakers until the 1980s, when it fell into disrepair.

The Friends of Tynemouth Outdoor Pool are a charity set up in 2012 to regenerate the pool and turn it into a sustainable business. They are aiming to raise £5.5m to regenerate the pool alongside facilities such as a community space, café and gym.

Sporting Assets and Community Shares Company will work together to develop a community share issue and financing mix to fund the project, delivering strategic support, community engagement and securing social investment along the way. Community shares are expected to fund £1m of the project cost, and will be launched in late 2016.

Campus Skateparks

Campus Skateparks runs two indoor skateparks; The Pool and The Park, both offering a range of activities from pay and play, to coaching, private hire plus regular lock in sessions. In addition the Park Centre offers a youth club facility to local young people. The skate facilities attract people from all over Bristol, and beyond.

Sporting Assets, with Substance, are providing business development advice along with Impact Measurement development and implementation. We are supporting them with the consolidation of their business after recent growth, reviewing their financial management as well as helping them enhance their social impact by the identification of new engagement programmes and public sector commissioning opportunities for their youth work.

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Services

Sporting Assets is a pioneering and multi-talented social enterprise offering a wide range of bespoke advisory services to benefit and support sporting communities, governing bodies and Local Authorities. We have a team of experienced professionals, who all excel in their given fields and innovate to meet changing trends in Government policies, Local Authority budgets, and sources of finance. Here are some of our key services.

SPORTS ASSETS OWNERSHIP

Sporting Assets is the first specialist organisation dedicated to helping sports communities take control of, and improve valued facilities. We cover the whole process, from feasibility to transfer, from structuring to finance, and from incorporation to long term management support.

There has been a major increase in community Asset Transfers, with political encouragement and specialist bodies supporting both Local Authorities and community groups. We believe innovative, exciting and sustainable solutions can be delivered for owning and managing precious sports facilities.

If communities have more control over their sporting assets then new sustainable methods of getting people to play sport will follow. Sporting Assets can help Local Authorities and sports communities identify the buildings, land and sports facilities that could be transferred as sustainable assets.

Our expert practitioners in sports & business development and community finance will then facilitate the transaction, supporting all parties involved so that costs are kept manageable and helping to deliver any associated facility development. Our comprehensive specialist service includes innovative structuring solutions, legal incorporation, business planning, training and capacity building, raising finance and perhaps, most importantly of all, encouragement and continuous support.

RAISING FINANCE

From generating ideas and funds for smaller sports clubs, to managing complex and large takeovers we offer a range of services that enable sporting communities to attract finance, develop their enterprises and become sustainable.

A wide range of options now are available for sporting communities to raise significant levels of funding in the UK, including routes such as grant schemes, loan finance, impact investment, community shares or crowdfunding, and using tax reliefs. Sporting Assets has developed bespoke funding strategies that provide us with unique insights into sporting communities and the finances available to them, which in turn allow us to deliver innovative financing structures and solutions for our clients and partners.

Our team brings together complementary skills in raising finance, combining expert knowledge of private and social finance with a specialist knowledge in grants, fundraising, community finance plus private finance methods that may be adopted in the community sector.

Our team’s track record includes: building and managed sport funding programmes of a value of £20 million whilst at Sport England; establishing the Supporters Direct Community Shares Unit, which secured over £2.5 million of investment in its initial two years via community share offers; and projects that have raised over £15 million in social investment.

Even if you feel you do not have the funds please contact us for an initial chat, as we can often secure third party funding to pay for our support and can offer flexible methods of structuring payment, including via success fees.

SPORTS AND BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT

We can offer extensive guidance on legal structures, governance, marketing and service development as well as business planning and networking for individuals and groups wanting to get their projects off the ground.

Sporting Assets work is designed to give you all that you need to drive your business forward. Our consultants have worked with public and health authorities, and well-known charities and social enterprises to undertake feasibility studies, measure social impact, build consortia, market testing of new ideas, undertake business plans and deliver growth.

This service is not exclusively focused on helping new projects grow. If you have an existing social enterprise, charity or community organisation we can work with you to stimulate growth and deliver maximum social impact. Our experience and understanding of the opportunities and challenges that community and social enterprises face places us at the cutting edge of growth support.
We spend time getting to know your organisation, ensuring we understand your sector and how you work.

Our Team

Tom Hall

Founder Director

Tom has a wealth of experience and is a proven innovative thinker with an excellent track record of delivery. He is an expert business development adviser for sports based social enterprises with specialisms in community asset transfers, sustainable growth strategies and raising capital finance.

Richard Speak

Founder Director

Richard is a Chartered Accountant and trained in law, specialising in corporate finance, equity and debt fundraising. He has turned his focus to Social Investment and was instrumental in setting up the Blackburn Rovers Supporters Trust group of social enterprises and charities, and is now a leading Impact Investment specialist working in Social Finance.

Paul Ebied

Director

Paul is a Chartered Accountant who previously worked in accountancy practice and the infrastructure industry. He has completed the On Purpose programme; a one year fellowship designed to develop leaders in the social enterprise sector. He specialises in developing financial models to plan business growth, acquire funding and ensure long-term sustainability. Paul joined Sporting Assets in July 2015.

Pete Maguire

Director

Pete is an experienced business consultant with nearly 20 years’ experience advising businesses and sport sector VCSEs. Pete supports community organisations across a range of issues from initial feasibility and asset transfer through to large scale social investment readiness; and works with national bodies, supporting the development and delivery of their facilities and investment strategies.

Nicky Roche

Director of Strategy

Nicky was a Civil Servant until 2013, including Director of Sport for DCMS, where she led on the Government strategy on public participation in sport and on Olympic and Paralympic sport. Nicky was awarded a CBE for services to the staging of the London 2012 Games. She is on the Board of UK Sport and chairs their major events panel. She is a keen horse rider and athletics fan.

Richard Fishlock

Director of Operations

Richard has over 20 years’ experience of project management, business development and grant assessment and procurement in the sport, leisure and community development sectors. Richard’s ‘hands on’ project management experience is underpinned by a detailed working knowledge of strategic planning, regeneration, grant giving policy, government strategies and wider development frameworks.

Testimonials

Sporting Assets have been of tremendous help and support and we would strongly recommend their services. We will certainly use them again in the future should the need arise

Chester and District Football League

We could not have been achieved what we have without the help and commitment given to us through Sporting Asset. They have been there to guide us through recent projects and without their professional help and guidance we would not be in the strong position we are now in.

East Lancashire Football Development Association

Sporting Assets have been a pleasure to work with - from project conception all the way through to completion, they have enabled us to make a step-change in our organisation

Lewes FC

Four reasons to come to us

1.

We offer innovative funding solutions via a range of instruments from a number of sources. We transfer and apply methods from alternative areas and sectors making our service unique and bespoke; taking advantage of new funds, tax breaks and ownership models to help maximise community, social and private investment.

2.

We can offer strong development strategies, programmes and partnerships to make organisations asset and investment ready.

3.

We are uniquely placed to help groups secure grants and other third party finance, which means our clients often don’t have to pay us directly.

4.

We focus our attention completely on our clients by only working with a small number of projects at any one time. This ensures a holistic service for the community groups, umbrella organisations and public authorities that commission Sporting Assets.

Contact

We would be delighted to discuss your project with you.
For an initial conversation on your specific ideas, please feel free to reach out to us on any of the below.
We will aim to reply within 2 working days.